Beginning Sunday, March 22, at 8 p.m., US 6 will be closed between US 40 and SH 119 to accommodate planned work on the Peaks to Plains Trail project. The highway will reopen Saturday, March 28 at 5 p.m. This closure limits access to I-70 from Golden; access to Black Hawk and Central City from Golden will remain open.

As always, contact the Public Information Team at or p2ptrail@publicinfoteam.com for more information. You can also check out the project blog at peaks2plains.wordpress.com.

About This WorkThis six-day closure will allow crews to install an underpass for the Clear Creek County section of the trail just east of Tunnel 5. This will enable the trail to safely “cross” US 6 and follow the Creek and join up with the Jefferson County portion of the trail. The underpass is a critical connector for the new, 4-mile trail, and will be 8 feet wide, 10 feet tall and 126 feet long.

Crews will work in two, 12-hour shifts to complete the work on time. In order to complete this work, guardrail, asphalt and bridge slabs will be removed. Then, crews will dig into the ground and set a large, pre-constructed concrete culvert into place. Dirt and other excavated materials will then be “backfilled,” or replaced.

For Your SafetyThe highway will be closed to traffic for the safety of the traveling public. Motorists are encouraged to plan alternate routes to I-70 from Golden in advance of travel. Once again, travel to Black Hawk and Central City will not be impacted.

This construction work will require crews to dig a hole in the ground that is deeper than the deep end of a swimming pool. Heavy equipment and machinery will be needed in order to complete the underpass. There will be no room to safely navigate the traveling public around the work, making it necessary to completely close the road.

All local emergency service providers have been notified of the closure, and signs will be posted to notify local motorists.

In case of inclement weather, backup dates for this work will be Sunday, March 29, at 8 p.m. through Saturday, April 4, at 5 p.m.

The images enclosed depict a map of the construction zone, and what the finished product will look like.

A rendering of the finished product.

A map showing the construction zone.

This information is a public crowdsourcing effort between the Access Fund,
and Mountain Project.You should confirm closures, restrictions, and/or related dates.

Description

Hot Stuff may be the best warm up route on the Wall of The 90s. It follows a line left of the great roof system and is belayed off a large flat ledge. Facing west, this is a perfect place to climb, to tan, or just dig the traffic flowing endlessly up Clear Creek. If you listen carefully you can just hear the loose change clanging in all of the pockets heading up to Black Hawk. Hot Stuff is never more than vertical, and for the most part offers great edge climbing with a lot of continuity. An awkward little pillar presents the only conceptual problem at about 65 ft. Hang a bit right and swim up on excellent holds with good feet. The technical crux follows shortly and is mostly thin and a bit committing, but the pro is great and the creep factor minimal. Three stars for quality climbing, well bolted, with lots of continuity.

Protection

QDs only. At 130 to 140 feet, Hot Stuff is a long route for a sport climb. Take 16 or so draws and something for the double-bolt anchor at the top.

Per Tzilla Rapdrilla: an anchor was added at the point that is roughly even with the Leftover Stuff anchor and should be usable for people with 60m ropes. It is located a good 20' below the existing anchor. A distinct effort was made to get the anchor as low as possible without putting it right in the middle of the crux, but there were limitations in finding solid rock for the anchor site.

What was a situation where double ropes were STRONGLY recommended since there was no mid-point anchor has been ameliorated in 2009. Still, be careful!

Warning

Per Tzilla Rapdrilla: The monster death cookie (4' x 2' x 2') by the belay is now gone. It yielded easily with just a lift to the end and then quickly dropped under its 300 or so lbs. of weight. Thanks to Derek Lawrence for spotting and keeping people away.

Hot Stuff is yet one of the best climbs that I have done in the Canyon. The exposure, length, and sequence moves on this climb make it a great route. If you are looking for a good, extended one-pitch climb in the canyon that is not too hard, but still offers some challenge, hit this climb. You will have a sweet time!

Just saw under comments for "Hey Good Lookin'" (right next to this route) that the first clip is gone from Hot Stuff. Sorry to hear that. I do not do much sport climbing, so I usually feel less secure on sport/face routes than in cracks, and I appreciate the bolts being there! I certainly hope it reappears. This is a nice route.

3/11/02 - All bolts and holds in place--this route kicks ass! One thing to consider, though. Since the leader has to trail a second rope for the rap, you've got quite an added load by the time you hit the high crux--decent pump factor if you're a weekend warrior like me. Eat your wheaties!

You don't need to trail a second rope, just climb to top, anchor yourself, pull up the rope (through the draws), drop the rope. You then have your belayer lower you (cleaning the draws, which sometimes poses a problem), when your belayer notices you are close to the end, anchor in. Your belayer then ties in the second rope while you anchor yourself to an existing bolt. The belayer passes the knot between the two ropes while your anchored..that's my way, but i'm sure there are others.

Good call. Once you top out, pull your rope up through the draws, tie it off and toss it down to the belayer. He ties the other rope on, haul the knot up to the anchors and clean the route on rappel. The route is so straight and the anchors are perfectly placed for toproping using the two ropes...no drag at all or directionals needed.

Doing it this way requires anyone toproping it to anchor in at the 3rd bolt while the belayer passes the knot.

An absolute "Must Do" in Clear Creek! But what the hell? Why not just trail the second rope (or better yet since we're supposedly still a "team" (even though it's a sport-climb)) have your belayer follow and clean and trail the extra rope. That way, you both get to do the route and and get to avoid any "mid-climb" rope transfer hassles.

WARNING... there's a big block (100-150 lbs?) just down and to the left of the anchors on this one that looks like it's barely hanging in there.... The cracks on different sides of it are rotted-- the situation wigged me out a bit. Be nice if someone could clean this on out of there, but due to the height and possible other dangers it could be a dangerous project. If it comes down on a climber, s/he'd be toast... My partner tapped it and said it sounded loose; I didn't even want to touch the thing before I rapped and moved the hell down the cliff. Be aware.

Good suggestion about trailing the second rope with the follower, Dave. We did that as well. Very fun route. We were pressed for time after work, but will check out the other routes soon. The looming wall across the creek beckons.

Would disagree with Richard Wright a little bit. The "awkward pillar" does bulge beyond vertical a bit and is pumpy for a leader at this level, like me! Still, a great route! Was especially good today with the canyon closed to thru traffic and trucks.

You can escape left to the anchors of Leftover Stuff at bolt #11 with a shoulder-length runner. This keeps ya from having to bring a second rope, and only miss out on the last two clips of easier climbing.

Very fun climbing. An excellent sport climb on great stone. The crux (getting thru the sharp-shinned "pillar"/roof) felt like 10c'ish - I went up the left side of this "pillar". . . maybe the right side is a bit easier, but it seems off-route. Some of the "Goldshuts", are slight spinners. For the good stone and fun movement, and the length, I'd give 'er 3 stars at 10b/c.

I can't believe that the block identified in 2003 by the belay is still there. That thing is the king of the death cookies if there ever was one. When I first saw it I thought that it had to be one long piece that was somehow wedged into the wall, but no, it's fractured right at the point where it intersects the wall. This thing needs to go big time. Don't even sneeze when you're near it. Hopefully we can organize a small group very soon to remove this looming danger as you need a couple of people on the ground on either side to keep people out of the way when it goes. It seems that it may also be a good idea to add an anchor at the 100' mark as well to avoid what happened to Chad.

Remember CCC is not the rock gym. The rock is basically crap and the only way it was rendered climbable in most cases was through extensive digging, trundling and cleaning.

The monster death cookie (4' x 2' x 2') by the belay is now gone. It yielded easily with just a lift to the end and then quickly dropped under its 300 or so lbs. of weight. Thanks to Derek Lawrence for spotting and keeping people away. Fortunately it didn't do any damage to holds hangers or even the belay ledge and is now a welcome addition to the talus below. I'm not sure if this block was there in its detached condition when the route went in or shifted outward over the last few years, but it should have been tossed long ago.

Additionally an anchor was added at the point that is roughly even with the Leftover Stuff anchor and should be usable for people with 60m ropes. It is located a good 20' below the existing anchor. A distinct effort was made to get the anchor as low as possible without putting it right in the middle of the crux, but there were limitations in finding solid rock for the anchor site. All hardware for this was provided by the Anchor Replacement Initiative/Climbing Magazine, so please show them your support. Hopefully with this anchor at an obvious point at the end of the interesting climbing accidents like the one that happened to Chad earlier this year will not recur. This was the only route left on the wall that didn't have an anchor point within 30m of the ground (if there are others, post them up). It will still be important to watch where you belay with a 60m rope as they're not always the same length and this is a long route. In fact, Derek's 70m rope came up quite short from the top anchor while mine reached to the ledge the other day.

Used one 60m rope on this today (going straight up, not left to Left Over Stuff) and both the lower and rap worked out a-ok, plopping us right down on the obvious belay ledge with about 5 feet to spare.

This felt very easy. Big and positive holds all the way. Frequent rests. The last moves at the top to the new anchor on the right seemed to be the crux for me, but even there you are in balance, and just have to figure things out. Much easier than Left Over Stuff for me.

Can a moderator please update the description for this climb to include the addition of the low anchor that was added to this climb in 2009. Also, can't we delete a bunch of these comments dating back to 2001 talking about issues that have been solved (i.e. needing a second rope and the death block that was removed)?

Nice relaxed start; pull hard on large jugs over the first roof; the crux is the column midway up, and trust that crimper on the midface - it's quite positive. Heel hook around the R of the column perhaps - it stays steep and pumpy. Overall, this is an endurance route.